BirdBrain provides teachers with independent reading for the highest and lowest readers in their classroom while also meeting the demands of the Common Core State Standards. To do this, BirdBrain Science serves differentiated science articles at multiple reading levels. Students can all read the same basic content at their independent reading level. Each article features engaging and cheeky artwork and is followed by a quiz that helps determine the level of their next article. To help science teachers transition into Common Core, quizzes also include optional Common Core aligned free response questions. All articles are written from the 3rd to 8th grade reading levels, and are currently being written to reach up to 12th grade levels during Spring 2014. All articles include the same basic content, but vary in length and complexity to account for classrooms of diverse learners. Created in a classroom, the goal is to give teachers more time to spend time focusing on learning activities, rather than scouring inadequate textbooks or the Web for reading that’s appropriate for both their students and the content they’re teaching. As the company says: Every student reads. Every student learns. Every student improves. Check it out.

One Response to Cool Tool | BirdBrain

The free response questions do not reflect the reading of the articles through a scientific lens. Questions should focus on students analyzing the information using text-based evidence. This needs to be worked on to be truly Common Core-aligned.